Dear God, Why Can't We Have a Baby?

I am always searching for things on the internet, and searching my Bible for things about infertility. I saw this on Bethany which is an awesome site! I read this and thought John's response was very interesting to me. Take it or leave it, I thought it was good, and it encouraged me. Also, some of the verses are quoted in NIV - I am a firm believer in the KJV 1611!




Dear John Van Regenmorter,

All my life I've dreamed of becoming a wife and mother: I would be married in my early 20s and have four children by the time I was 30. I firmly believed that if God had put such a desire in my heart, He would certainly fulfill it. I didn't get married until I was 30 1/2. During our second year of marriage, my husband had trouble with a seizure disorder. We tried for 2 1/2 years to get pregnant. Then in 1997, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I praise God that I am cancer-free, but now I've learned that all those months I kept charts, I never ovulated! I am 36 years old now, and I feel it is hopeless and useless to keep trying to get pregnant. Sometimes I feel God has played a cruel joke on me. He gave me the desire to be a mother, but then removed the ability. I don't have a problem with adoption, but we can't afford it. I feel like a second-rate person. I'm not good enough to be given children. Even single teens have children, while I can't.



John's Response:

I understand your deep frustration and sense of despair. Life does not seem fair! We hear stories of careless teens or abusive parents becoming pregnant, while couples who love the Lord are sometimes left with empty arms.You raise some good questions for which I do not have the adequate answers. Ultimately, the answers to your questions may need to wait until you can talk to Jesus face-to-face. Until then, we are called to live by faith, not sight (2 Corinthians 5:7). And frankly, God never promised that living by faith would be easy!Though I cannot answer all of your questions, I would like to make a couple of observations:First, your question reminds me of Asaph, the writer of Psalm 73. Asaph was a godly man who also fell into the trap of thinking that God was not treating him fairly. As Asaph saw it, God seemed to be showering His blessings on unbelievers, while Asaph barely received a sprinkle. Asaph wrote: "They [the wicked] have no struggles; their bodies are healthy and strong. They are free from the burdens common to man" (vs. 4-5 NIV). As far as Asaph could tell, there was no point in being godly because God seemed to be blessing the ungodly more than him.However, at the end of Psalm 73, Asaph came to realize that his thinking had been shortsighted and wrong. He saw that our life on earth was only the tip of the iceberg in terms of our existence. Sure, unbelievers may have things to pretty well for them in this life, including the opportunity to have babies, but unless they repent and bow their knees, their final destiny is not a pretty picture. As Asaph put it, "Then I understood their final destiny... How suddenly they are destroyed" (vs. 19 NIV). As for those who have maintained their walk with God, they have the most important blessing: They know that in the midst of all their troubles, God has remained with them, and they will be in the joy of God's presence forever. As Asaph declared:
Yet, I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.You guide me by your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. (vs. 23-24). Second, it is easy for Christians to fall into the trap of thinking that somehow God owes us something because we have been so good. He owes us nothing! Each of us has sinned and has fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:16). Any gift we receive from God, including children, is a gift of grace, totally unearned and undeserved. And if God -- for reasons known only to His divine and sovereign will -- chooses to give gifts to people who appear more sinful than we are, who are we to question him? The apostle Paul puts it bluntly when he asks: "But who are you O man to talk back to God? Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?'" Third, it is true that all of the well-known infertile couples in the Bible (Abraham and Sarah, Jacob and Rachel, Hannah and Elkanah, and Zechariah and Elizabeth) eventually were able to have children. But it is also true that God does not grant every prayerful desire (see 2 Corinthians 12:8-9). The Father did not, could not, even grant the request of His own Son to have the awful cup of Calvary taken from Him (Mt. 26:39). God never promises that He will reward the faithful with an easy road through life. If you doubt that, read what happened to some of the most faithful saints in the Bible (Hebrews 11: 35-40). What God promises us is that He will eventually, either in this life or in the life to come, turn our adversity into our profit.